CHIPs Are Falling

It’s been one of the more popular federal programs the past two decades, but Congress failed to renew the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) before its authorization ran out Sept. 30. Now it’s unclear whether legislation to extend the program will pass before states, such as Florida, run out of money to keep the it afloat.

And children’s health is now a political pawn in Washington, D.C.

Enrollees in the state’s CHIP program - known in Florida as KidCare - are required to pay monthly premiums of $15 or $20. KidCare is reliant on federal funding, which accounts for 96 percent of its overall spending. If Congress doesn’t act soon to renew CHIP funding, Florida’s CHIP program will be forced to make some painful - and unpopular - choices. These could include shutting down the program until funding is restored and sending closure notices to thousands of Utah families as early as mid-January.

This problem is not unique to Florida. States across the country will also be running out of funding and left with the same hard decisions.

According to the federal government’s benefits resource website, CHIP provides health coverage to nearly eight million children and families nationally with incomes too high to qualify for Medicaid, but can't afford private coverage. Benefits covered through CHIP include routine check-ups, immunizations, doctor visits, prescriptions, dental and vision care, inpatient and outpatient hospital care, laboratory and X-ray services, and emergency services - in other words, basic health care options.

CHIP usually has near-unanimous bipartisan support, but has been neglected the last quarter of 2017 because of Congressional Republicans’ preoccupation with passing their current tax plan to redistribute our national wealth to billionaires and to repeal the Affordable Care Act. As a result, we have seen our leaders repeatedly ignore the needs of children. Instead, they have taken actions that put children’s health care at risk.

Adding insult to metaphorical injury, the GOP tax plan would repeal the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate which, according to the Congressional Budget Office, will cause 13 million fewer Americans to be covered by 2027 because they will opt not to get insurance. Additionally, Americans could expect a 10 percent spike in premiums in most years over the next decade. So not only are Congressional Republicans not helping children who depend on CHIP, they are repealing the individual mandate, and in doing so, saving over $300 billion to help pay for their massive tax cuts.

And yet, CHIP funding is in limbo.

Taking care of our children’s health care is supposed to be about people, not politics. Sadly, I'm not so sure this is the case anymore, even if the CHIP issue is resolved before it’s too late. I hope Congress gets its priorities straightened out and allow citizens across the nation to have the medical certainty they deserve and need.

A Small Step For Educators

It’s not what teachers in the Palm Beach School District were hoping for, but a moderate pay raise will pacify 12,500 educators, as well as other district employees and administrators in the new year.

The agreement, unanimously approved by the district Board of Education this week, gives teachers evaluated as “effective” last year 2.75 percent raises, while those rated “highly effective” are in line for a 3.5 percent increase in pay. The tentative raises are retroactive to July 1, and will be the largest that the county’s teachers have seen in four years if ratified by the Classroom Teachers Association membership.

District administrators, including Superintendent Dr. Robert Avossa, will see 3 percent raises.

In all, the raises will tally around $30 million.

While CTA President Justin Katz implied he is generally pleased with the final negotiation numbers - and there are some notable improvements over recent contracts - I'm not sure we’d call it a “victory.” Since the loss of automatic annual “step” salary increases several years ago, plus increases associated with insurance, teacher raises have not kept up with the cost of living; many teachers have lost thousands of dollars annually between what they were projected to make and where they stand today.

Factor in higher annual salaries and benefit packages in other states (especially along the east coast and in New England), and there are reasons the Palm Beach School District, like virtually every other district in Florida, is struggling to both bring in newer qualified educators and retain the educators recently hired.

On Facebook, Katz noted there “are efforts in the works to address salary compression” which will be dealt with during next year's negotiations. So possibly there’s hope on the horizon that teachers’ salaries may bounce back to where many believe they should be on the overall salary scale. 

The district is also pondering asking residents to support a small property tax increase, with the funds dedicated to teacher salaries in hopes of keeping them in district classrooms. Under the proposal being pushed by Avossa, voters would pay about $25 more per $100,000 of assessed property on their tax bills. If put on the ballot and approved, this would provide about $50 million a year toward teacher salaries.

While it’s easy to point at the district - and they are not entirely blameless here - at least they’re trying to be proactive. I'm not sure the same can be said in either the state or federal capitol. Many of the problems with funding public education in Florida today - that’s public education as a whole, not just salaries - stems from issues in both Washington, D.C. and Tallahassee. The continued push to use public education funding for charter schools, plus the continued chipping away of money dedicated to districts the past decade, has led to less financial flexibility for the district. 

Back in April, Avossa encouraged continued communication with state lawmakers, urging them to open the fiscal pursestrings and make education funding a priority. I urge continued open communications with both lawmakers and the work force you represent, and look forward to when teachers are truly compensated to where they want to stay in the profession. 

#MeToo

High-profile sexual harassment. Just a few years ago, it caused barely a ripple in the media, with the mid-1990s claims against President Bill Clinton and the early-2010s accusations against Bill Cosby seeming the only notable high-profile celebrity cases.

But in the past 13 months, starting with President Donald Trump’s infamous “Grab them by the pussy” Access Hollywood tape, it seems as if virtually every notable male member of the media and United States political machine has been infected by the Sexual Harassment Plague. It’s a “who’s who” list - Harvey Weinstein, Roy Moore, Charlie Rose, Al Franken, Matt Lauer, Garrison Keillor, John Conyers, David Sweeney, Louis C.K., Richard Dreyfuss, Dustin Hoffman, Andrew Kreisberg, John Lasseter, Jeremy Piven, Ben Affleck, Steven Seagal, Kevin Spacey, Jeffrey Tambor, George Takei, Mark Halperin, George H.W. Bush … and that’s just (some of) the names which have come out the past month!

What we are seeing today is a live-action broadcast of Howard Beale’s famous meltdown in Network: women today are mad as hell about being sexually harassed, and they’re not gonna take it anymore!

In large part, the extremely recent turn of events is a backlash against Trump, who has been accused at least 15 times since the 1980s of sexual assault and sexual harassment, and whose election on the heels of the previously-noted Access Hollywood tape revelation led to concerns of women being marginalized in the workplace and society.

And what a backlash it has been, starting with the Women's March - a worldwide protest on January 21, 2017 advocating legislation and policies regarding human rights, women's rights, immigration reform, healthcare reform, reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, racial equality, freedom of religion, and workers' rights. Far from being marginalized, women have found a rallying cry and a voice. And the proverbial dam burst with the graphic, detailed allegations by multiple women against Hollywood mogul Weinstein.

Which leads me to wonder, are men really that naive about sexual harassment?

It sure seems so. And that’s scary as hell.

But what is also scary to us is the real possibility that some of the already-accused and to-be-accused may very well be innocent of the allegations. Some of those listed previously deny the claims; others may be targeted by political opportunists. We’ve seen witch hunts before; just ask the good people of Salem, Mass. They aren’t for the feint of heart.

So, let’s keep our eye on the big picture. The only “good” Sexual Harassment in the Workplace is the smooth 1988 instrumental by Frank Zappa.

First of all, the punishment should fit the crime; there’s a world of difference between sexual harassment and an inappropriate relationship, and the last thing proponents of the charge need is to become this generation’s McCarthy Red Scare.

Secondly, as the Washington Post did with a failed sting operation recently - where the conservative watchdog group Project Veritas attempted to discredit the paper by planting a bogus story about Moore impregnating a 15-year-old - the media needs to do serious fact-checking on allegations before publishing stories. For those who have been accused, unjustly, they will be unable to fully clear their names with the public. And that’s just wrong.

Just as sexual harassment is wrong.